*Remembering Yankee Stadium:
EIGHTIES (For your reading pleasure adapted from
REMEMBERING YANKEE STADIUM: AN ORAL AND NARRATIVE HISTORY OF THE HOUSE THAT RUTH
BUILT, on sale everywhere, buy it now)

The 1981 World Series was Yankees versus Dodgers,
the third match-up between the two storied franchises in five years.
A 9-2 win at Yankee Stadium in Game Six gave the world championship
to Los Angeles.

KEITH JACKSON (GAME CALL, ABC-TV):

Watson hits it high in the air for the center fielder
Ken Landreaux, this should do it...and the Dodgers are the 1981
champions of baseball.

PRESS RELEASE (BOX)

I want to sincerely
apologize to the people of New York and to the fans
of the New York Yankees everywhere for the
performance of the Yankee team in the World Series.
I also want to assure you that we will be at work
immediately to prepare for 1982. –George
Steinbrenner

FRED CLAIRE:
Steinbrenner’s apology came in the form of a release
which he passed out after we won the series. I
though it was strange. The Yankees had given all
they could to win. There was really no need to
apologize for an all out effort by your team.

“The Boss” did much more
than apologize. He kicked ass and rolled heads. He
demeaned Dave Winfield, who had managed but one hit
in 21 at-bats in the Series. Having signed him to a
huge contract, Steinbrenner was furious at "Winny,"
dubbing him “Mr. May,” a sarcastic reference to
Winfield’s peak performance in May and poor
performance in the Fall Classic.

The commencement of the 1982
season at the Stadium was a hard time coming and as
far as Yankee fans were concerned – largely not
worth waiting for. Bob Lemon, who had managed the
final 25 games in 1981 last only through 14 games in
1982.

On April 6th, almost a foot of
snow cancelled Opening Day against Texas and the
next game, too. It was April 11th before the
ballpark was finally in shape for playing baseball.
In recognition of how hard the grounds crew worked
to make the field ready, crew chief Jimmy Esposito
was given the honor of throwing out the first ball.
The Yankees lost both games of an Easter Sunday
doubleheader to Chicago. But at least their season
was finally underway.

The roster had what Yogi Berra
would call “deep depth” with a pitching staff
featuring splendid southpaws Ron Guidry, Tommy John,
and Dave Righetti. Goose Gossage was a
flame-throwing stopper. Still, even with all that
talent, the Yankees could not get it going. In June,
they were 9 1 /2 games out.

On August 3rd, the White Sox took
two from the Yankees at the Stadium and “the Boss”
fired Gene Michael, who had replaced Bob Lemon,
replacing him with Clyde King.

All season long Steinbrenner kept
his circus jumping, seeking quick fixes. Beyond a
trio of managers, he went through a merry-go-round
of three hitting coaches, five pitching coaches, and
47 players. The chaos and the musical chairs did not
make for an environment that suited a winning ball
club.

The 1982 Yankees were not a
winning club. They ended the season in fifth place,
16 games behind Milwaukee. They would not return to
post-season play for the next 13 years. From that
season until 1991, with George Steinbrenner having
his say and having his way, the Stadium would become
a mix and match of players and pilots. Highlighting
the mayhem of the era were eleven managerial changes
including the hiring and firing of Billy Martin six
times. “They know what the bottom line is,”
Steinbrenner said. . . .

Harvey Frommer is in his 38th year of writing books.
A noted oral historian and sports journalist, the author of 42 sports
books including the classics: "New York City Baseball,1947-1957" and
"Shoeless Joe and Ragtime Baseball," his acclaimed REMEMBERING YANKEE
STADIUM was published in 2008 and his REMEMBERING FENWAY PARK: AN ORAL
AND NARRATIVE HISTORY OF THE HOME OF RED SOX NATION was published to
acclaim in 2011. The prolific Frommer is at work on When It Was
Just a Game, An Oral History on Super Bowel One.

His work has appeared in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times,
Washington Post, New York Daily News, Newsday, USA Today, Men's Heath,
The Sporting News, among other publications.

FROMMER SPORTSNET (syndicated) reaches a readership in the millions and
is housed on Internet search engines for extended periods of time.
on Twitter: http://twitter.com/south2nd
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on the Web: http://www.dartmouth.edu/~frommer

Dr. Frommer is the Official Book Reviewer of Travel-Watch.
*Autographed copies of Frommer books are available .

Harvey
Frommer along with his wife, Myrna Katz Frommer are the authors of
five critically acclaimed oral/cultural histories, professors at Dartmouth
College, and travel writers who specialize in cultural history, food, wine, and Jewish history and heritage
in the United States, Europe, and the Caribbean.